Unity and Diversity in the New Testament by James D. G. Dunn (review)

BOOK REVIEWS 675 the person includes both (subjective) selfhood and (biological) individuality . How can the self attain transcendence' from within? Dupre explores several paths; and these indicate as well the reality of the supra-empirical self. Traditionally, he notes, ethical consciousness confronted philosophy with a transcendent dimension of self. But the true self is meta-ethical, finding the ground for moral action in its own sense of dependence on the transcendent. A second path starts from alienation-the diseased self-and here Dupre explores the complex area of healing. Third, artistic creations may lead us toward transcendence, symbolizing the ultimately real, even when the art is not overtly religious. Dupre notes that the abstract and formalist movement in the arts may impel the experiencer to go beyond the art-object itself; but this opening up, he suggests, does not suffice to show us transcendence, since for that we also need language. (Here I would demur; a painting by Rothko, for example, can directly evoke a mystical state). Fourth, drawing on Bergson and Husserl, Dupre develops the way temporality and memory overcome for us the annihilating impact of the notion that the self lives only in the outward present moment. Memory, he suggests, is "the gateway to the soul's ground where God and the self coincide." Next Dupre considers immortality of the self: he weighs what form of bodiliness might be possible for the deeper self beyond the grave. Finally, Dupre explores the experiences of mystics, both Eastern and Western, concluding from these that " the self is essentially more than a mere self, that transcendence belongs to its nature ...." MICHAEL MARSH 3701 Grant Road, N. W. Washington, D. 0. Unity and Diversity in the New Testament. By JAMES D. G. DUNN. Lon~ don: SCM Press, 1977. £rn.5o. Is there such a thing as orthodoxy? Can there ever be a final e